No white lies! I blame my parents. A firm upbringing that bending the truth was lying and that there are no white lies has meant a lifetime of annoying other people who don’t actually want their questions answered honestly.

How am I supposed to know! I’m not a mind reader!

‘How do I look?’

I would say to my mother on my way out to see a boyfriend in the 1970s. ‘Hmm’ would come the reply. ‘You look cross,’ she would say indicating my overly-darkened eyebrows.

A lifetime of not lying has made my mother very good at being truthful in ways that led to corrective action. I never over-darkened again...

‘Where’s my pale pink beret?’

I would ask her. ‘It looks like a giant nipple.

‘I don’t know where it is, I threw it over my shoulder and didn’t see where it landed’ she once said. That was stretching it a bit on the honesty front I feel.

But in my lifetime, that’s the only actual fib I can accuse her of and I’m sure she would say it was true that she didn’t see where it landed... in the back of the cupboard.

I’m glad my mother didn’t tell a ‘kind’ lie to save my feelings and let me go out looking cross with a giant nipple on my head.

The big problem with ‘white’ lies is that telling one places power with the person lying.

If I say, ‘how fat do I look in these trousers?’

I don’t want the person I ask to decide it’s nicer to say ‘not at all’ especially when there’s a risk that side-splitting laughter at the theatre could lead to a seat-splitting incident! (Nobody should have to see giant beige knickers on their night out!)

So does it matter that politicians lie? I think it does. And I’m an elected councillor.

We should be able to trust that councillors will exercise their own sense of ethics independently but too many don’t. They’re not allowed to.

The Liberal Democrats at Teignbridge claim they don’t have a whip system but as a Liberal Democrat member I can confirm that they absolutely do.

You are told to abstain if you disagree or to be strategically absent. I think that’s disgusting.

This is not something I have ever done. I always say what I think and I always vote what I believe.

The Conservatives locally are highly obedient as a group with a few exceptions but I must reluctantly admit that their leader does not seem to punish those who openly disagree with him.

We should have zero tolerance to physical acts on any scale.

An egregious physical act, however minor, by an elected councillor in a public meeting in my view serves to normalise violence.

That’s a very dangerous thing for a Liberal Democrat council to do.

The Liberal Democrat Group, (with one exception since sacked by Cllr Connett), immediately backed Cllr Taylor by sending a letter to the Liberal Democrat Head Quarters demonstrating their unequivocal support.

The lesson here is this; if you are considering standing as a Liberal Democrat Councillor, only do so if you are prepared to obey orders.